Chapter 41: Chapter 41: The Rise of Wisdom

CHAPTER FORTY ONE

The Rise of Wisdom

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“Now, if you experience any mental spasms—”

I raised my hand. “What kind of mental spasms are we talking about here?”

Nurse Pennyweather—this ageless-looking, plump dryad with short frizzy hair and gold-yellow skin—began ticking a list of issues ranging from sudden impaired speech and temporary loss of memory, which she called mild symptoms, to more worrying conditions like seizures and uncontrolled bowel movement.

“Y-yeah, these are all temporary hypothetical symptoms, right?”

From my open window, I could see a crowd of onlookers gathered right outside the infirmary’s doors. They were most likely the friends of the injured novices inside, and it would be just my luck if I experienced some uncontrolled bowel movement while walking out that front door later.

“They’re very possible considering how much strain you’ve put on yourself.” She shook her head at me. “Mana burn is no simple condition, laddie.”

Nurse Pennyweather gave me a motherly pat on the head which was followed by a warm smile and a promise that I’d be fine if I kept up on the prescribed medication of vitamins B and D for the next few days—and I instantly liked her. With Divah, Mistress Lorelai, and the other adults I’ve met in these past five years, I realized that there weren’t enough warm, motherly figures in my life.

A flash of memory struck me then; the smiling red-haired woman who’d starred in a few of my barely remembered dreams. The ones where I was much younger and seemed far more innocent.

“Are you all right, lad?” Nurse Pennyweather asked.

I didn’t even notice the tear that had fallen down my cheek.

“Yeah…yeah…” I wiped it away in a hurry just as I wiped away that person’s face from my mind. “Something just got stuck in my eye.”

“Would you like me to take a look?” she asked.

“No, I’ll be fine.” I waved away her concern. “So, we’re all good?”

“As good as you can be considering the night you’ve had…” Nurse Pennyweather’s gaze drifted to the many filled cots in her infirmary. “I wish I’d been there myself. Might have saved a few more of you novices if I were.”

The reminder that I’d failed in the perfect clear achievement of last night’s dungeon break made my chest feel even heavier now. But, choosing not to wallow and think about the lives lost to my plan, I said my goodbyes to Nurse Pennyweather and began my walk toward the infirmary’s front door. Strange how that hallway seemed to get longer the more I trudged on though. As if something were forcing me to confront the accusatory stares of the novices who’d manage to find their way to one of the infirmary’s many cots.

Well, that wasn’t entirely true, because even from my peripheral, I could see a mixture of gratitude and respect among some of the injured people I just passed by. They were few and far between though.

With last night’s success, I imagined more people in the Academy thought better of me now. At least that’s what I hoped. However, as soon as I opened that infirmary door, I found a sea of novice faces glaring pointedly back at me.

“Okay~~y… when did I get on everyone’s bad side?” My brow furrowed. “Were there even these many kids at the Academy?”

Honestly, it was like I was back at the proving ground where I’d had my Crucible. That’s how many people had come to gawk and glare at me.

“You guys want something?” I asked.

No sooner had those words spilled from my mouth when I was suddenly bombarded by requests for a duel. Yep, all these people had gathered here just to pick a fight with me. There were two or three confessions of love too, but it wasn’t these proposals that made me blush. The arrival of Liara coming to my defense on that top step did that.

No, it wasn’t a caveboy thing. This was me feeling glad that I now had one ally who wasn’t Divah and who also didn’t mind facing a sea of rivals on my behalf. What more could a guy want in a partner?

Liara gave the crowd a frosty glare that made more than a few shoulders visibly shiver. Of course, she’d had a great reputation among the novices even before I arrived at the Academy, so it wasn’t surprising that many of them began wilting away at her glare. There were quite a few, however, who stood their ground despite Liara’s presence. Anal was there looking all haughty as usual. So was his half-orc buddy, Kaveera, whom I hadn’t seen since that first day. Most of the others I didn’t know, but even from where I stood, I could tell that they were all serious challengers.

“Okay.” I cracked my knuckles. “Let’s get it—”

Liara grabbed me by the wrist and pulled me away before I could send my challenge out to these drengrs though. And, feeling like a boy being dragged away from the playground by his big sister, I followed Liara down the steps and through the crowd that had parted for us like Moses parting the Red Sea. At least until we got right in front of Kaveera who refused to step out of the way.

“Holding hands with filthy human scum”—Kaveera’s gaze drifted momentarily down to mine and Liara’s interlocked hands—“is just more proof of how low you’ve fallen, half-breed… I never could see what Lisah or Draken saw in you.”

Hold on. Did the half-orc just imply that Draken had also been Liara’s—Holy Hel, what a revolting development.

Kaveera’s taunts weren’t as bad as Anal’s though. He just had to mention something I thought only Dwalinn and a few others knew about. The fact that Liara’s pureblood father was among the missing adventurers of what Anal called, “Last night’s failed raid.”

“I hear Representative Löwenthal isn’t actually missing…” Anal leaned in so that the few of us close enough to him could hear his next words. “I hear he’s dead and that his corpse was so mutilated that they can’t properly identify him without—”

Liara was too stunned to move. She didn’t have to, however, because I couldn’t hold myself back. Not after I saw the worry flash across her face.

My fist flew at Anal. Unfortunately, with mana burn still weighing me down, mine was a punch that barely had any strength—which is why I hit Anal in that arm he had on a sling. Dastardly, I know, but it was Anal, and he kind of deserved it.

Funnily enough, as soon as my fist struck his shoulder—thereby eliciting a painful shriek from the arrogant jerk—Anal was also attacked by a second assailant who came at him from his blindside.

To my surprise, the pretty-boy elf I’d seen that one time at the Great Library just socked Anal good in the face, and at full power too. The bright elf spaz fell to the ground on his ass, his face a priceless visage of shock and fear.

“What sort of false yarns are you spinning into my sister’s ears, Einarr Adelstein?” the pretty boy elf growled.

“Lunden Löwenthal…” Anal looked suddenly admonished. “I didn’t mean—”

“I wasn’t aware House Adelstein had the grit to threaten a member of House Löwenthal or declare my father was dead without proof,” the pretty boy elf expertly cut Anal off while also managing to subtly threaten him.

Okay, admittedly, I’d been shocked by that earlier revelation about Draken. However, this new arrival claiming Liara was his sister was an even bigger shocker.

He was a tall elf with long, pale blonde hair and a pretty boy face like one might find on the cover of a Realmsflix poster. Now that I’d seen their dad up close, this pretty boy elf looked a lot like a younger version of Lorias Löwenthal, which also meant he and Liara shared similar features too.

As for Anal, he was sputtering out excuses like the slimy turd I knew he was. What a cliché.

“I’m fine. Leave it alone,” Liara insisted, although her words were barely a whisper.

Lunden heard her easily enough though. Elf ears were good at picking up sounds like that. His gaze drifted to Liara—and I could see a similar affection on his face that Lorias had also shown her. But then his gaze fell on our intertwined hands, and those almond-shaped eyes of his got even wider.

Luckily for me, I didn’t get to have an awkward confrontation with big bro, because, at that moment, Nurse Pennyweather walked out of her abode, and seeing the crowd gathered around the infirmary, she yelled in a not-so-tender voice, “This is a place of healing and rest!”

She raised a short birch staff in our general direction, and the crystal pommel at its tip began to glow.

“If you’ve got no injuries to speak of, then it’s best to be away with you”—Nurse Pennyweather scanned the sea of faces—“or I wouldn’t mind giving you a reason to want to visit my infirmary.”

Of course, I should have known the warm, motherly dryad had a dark side which I now realized was typical of Grandmaster Dwalinn’s staff choices.

Liara pulled me along as we got lost in a crowd of escaping novices, and I couldn’t help but notice that she avoided her brother’s eyes, which left me awkwardly shrugging at him as we passed him by.

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The funeral for the dead novices happened around sunset in the far eastern region of the campus grounds near the border of a training area that Liara called the Wandering Wood. By the edge of its southern tree line was a lake whose waters tipped over the edge of the Academy’s branch to fall into the roots of Yggdrasil below. It was here by the wooden wharf of Lady Lake that Dwalinn began the ceremony for our departed.

Three of the dead had been claimed by their families, which is why only five wooden boats were being prepared for their journey into the afterlife. In each boat was body a wrapped in linen surrounded by the things they had in life and more. Wildflowers filled the spaces between weapons, armor, and mortal spoils, including hobgoblin heads, maenad hides, snake women’s skin, and other materials taken from last night’s battle.

I even placed a small piece of the blue-eyed emissary’s patchwork cloak in Bjorn the Viking’s funeral boat because I did feel bad that he had died again.

Blessed oil was poured onto each boat and then they were cast off into the lake where they floated on waters whose surface reflected the orange glow of the Realm Ethereal’s setting sun, basking our dead in gilded gold long before the first fire arrows lit their flames.

“Behold, I see my father and my mother…” Master Doomsday began the funeral rite. “Behold, I see my brothers and my sisters…”

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Those of us who’d gathered—mostly just the masters and novices who’d been present during the battle plus a few friends of the departed—took up the next verse after Doomsday. “Behold, I see my ancestors seated in the All-Father’s great hall with its treasures ever-gleaming and the mead ever-flowing!”

In this gloomy atmosphere, Liara and I pressed our shoulders against each other and found a bit of comfort in that closeness. We didn’t know the dead very well, but they’d been comrades who’d fought and died for us.

Our voices were louder at the end. “In the hall of the All-Father—to glorious Valhalla—where the brave will live forever!”

Unsurprisingly, the outdoor revelry that occurred after the funeral pyre was attended by nearly every novice of the Academy. Yep, they couldn’t be bothered to attend the funeral, but they were all there for the afterparty.

I was safe from threats and challenges, however, thanks to Mistress Lorelai and Master Doomsday being so close at hand and quite eager to discipline rowdy partygoers.

“This is a solemn event, you rascals!” Mistress Lorelai yelled at a pair of journeymen who’d nearly started a fistfight over a round of flyting.

Neither Helm Grimm nor Koby Grimm seemed remorseful though. At least not until Gin and Kin landed on the ground between their legs.

“Look at him strutting around with, Lockwood. Thinks he’s hot stuff now, doesn’t he?” I heard someone whisper while pointedly staring at me. “Bet you he’s just a lucky bastard.”

“We should teach the noob a lesson in manners,” another said. While their third companion added, “And take his stuff while we’re at it.”

All three elves grinned mischievously in my direction until Liara got in their line of sight and frowned at them. Then they dispersed as quickly as miasma escaped from the light of sage lamps.

This happened more than once throughout the party, too, which prompted Zen to suggest that I stay closer to where most of the tower novices were seated. “Just in case,” he added.

As for why everyone had become so eager to butt heads with me, well, I finally got an answer to that question and more after Liara and I found seats at a picnic table surrounded by blue cloaks.

“You haven’t checked your bar yet, have you?” Liara asked.

At her prompting, I did finally check the notifications on my bar.

“Hey, I leveled up again!” I pumped my fist under the table. “Two levels in one crazy night. Groovy.”

I noticed the slight furrowing of Liara’s brow.

“You didn’t level up?”

“I leveled up… once.”

“Ah, I see.”

“It’s not as easy for me. Moving past the twenties requires more time and effort.”

“Uhuh. I believe you.”

“Shut up and just look at your other notifications.”

A few of the notifications were messages from my teammates about tomorrow’s shopping trip, and I promised to reply to at least Dess later on. There were also some early recruitment fliers from guilds I’d heard of, although I wasn’t sure how they’d gotten my number or why they were even scouting an apprentice novice who didn’t have a license yet.

I also got a reminder from Red Beard about the chit I owed the Crimson Corsairs that also came with a reassurance that they wouldn’t need me right away.

“Get stronger, Will, and we’ll go on our adventure once you’ve gotten into the top hundred rankings of the Academy,” was basically how his message ended.

Finally, I received a notification from the Written Novice, which was the Academy’s school newspaper. Today’s headline caused my eyes to widen suddenly.

THE RISE OF WISDOM! NEWBIE APPRENTICE LEADS ACADEMY FORCES TO VICTORY OVER MONSTER HORDE!

“Vargr…” I whispered.

On the cover was a solo photo of me looking all smug while I surveyed the field that would eventually be filled with monster corpses. To be fair, I looked good.

The article itself went on to detail my many contributions, not just to the battle with the monster horde, but also included highlights from our fight with the maenad queen.

“Will’s strategy to funnel the maenads into that tight corridor made our fight super easy and fun,” I read Dess’s comments out loud.

The fairy wasn’t the only quote the Daily Novice got too. The one from Zen explaining how I’d disappeared in a flash and then killed the maenad queen’s serpent crown in the next second was told with such awesomeness and depth that even I felt embarrassed by the yeti’s praise.

Of course, praises weren’t the only thing I earned in this article. There were several scathing remarks from an unnamed source claiming that I was “Extremely lucky,” and, “prone to self-aggrandizing,” and, “human trash,” was also included in the article. That last bit easily gave away who exactly this unnamed source was though.

“Is he even allowed to be that blatantly racist in public?” I asked.

“He’s an unnamed source.” Liara shrugged. “So, that idiot can say whatever he wants.”

I took a while longer to scan the whole article, and then wondered if my potential being revealed this blatantly was a good or bad thing.

“The paper intentionally put a huge target on your back… They want people to come after you. I’m not sure why yet though,” Liara deduced.

Okay, I agree that the intent of this article wasn’t just to inform the public of last night’s events—it had a whiff of callousness to it. Especially with how blatantly the editorial team describes and analyzes my abilities while knowing exactly who their reader base was. However, assuming there was more malice to this than simply pranking me seemed far-fetched.

“Um, it’s a school paper, Liara,” I reasoned.

“It’s the newspaper of the number one adventurer school in the realmsverse, Wisdom. The pros read it too,” she argued. “How else will they know which novices might be worth recruiting when the time came for the next draft?”

“Holy Hel… you’re right.” My brow furrowed. “But, isn’t this a good thing?”

“Only if you want your rivals to know everything about you before you face them,” Liara pointed out. “As capable as you are, you’re still just an apprentice. Now everyone from Draken to Saga to my brother will want to fight you just so they can put you in your place while earning themselves more credibility.”

Once again, the she-elf had the right idea. Although, if I was being absolutely honest, I didn’t mind if they knew what I could do today because I was a hundred percent sure I would be stronger tomorrow. That was the whole point of Divah’s guide after all.

I mentioned this out loud to Liara who just rolled her eyes at me.

“You are such an arrogant human boy,” she sighed. “Never mind… your growing notoriety is a problem for another day. I’ve got something else to talk to you about…”

Liara fidgeted in place, and I could tell she was uncomfortable. It took her a while to get going too.

“I don’t pry into your circumstances and you don’t pry into mine… that’s worked for us so far, but”—she left her seat opposite me and moved over to squeeze onto my side of the picnic table—“I need a favor…”

In the short time that I’ve known her, I’ve learned that Liara was a proud elf. So, asking me for a favor must be a huge deal for her.

“What kind of favor?” I asked warily.

“You heard what Einarr said about…” She couldn’t even finish that sentence. “I’m sure you’ve also spoken to the Grandmaster about what he’d seen inside Lugh’s Lament.”

Oh, vargr. I’m pretty sure I knew where this was going now, but I let Liara finish her request anyway.

“Wisdom…” The she-elf turned to me, and for the first time since we’d met, I saw unguarded emotion flash across her face. “I need your help to find my father!”